Passive investment products, such as exchange-traded funds (ETFs), continued to show positive sales in recent months despite plunging net sales in the wider European funds industry.
Tracker funds in the UK saw net retail inflows of £777 million (€863 million) in November, while the wider UK funds industry saw redemptions of £2.1 billion, according to the latest Investment Association (IA) data.
As previously reported, November was the same month when ETFs and other exchange-traded products (ETPs) in Europe saw the equivalent of €4.46 billion of net inflows while the wider European industry saw net outflows of €42.6 billion.
Meanwhile, the most recent figures for ETFs and ETPs show that in December they saw net inflows of US$76.24 billion (€66.35 billion) at the global level – the second highest figure on record, according to ETFGI. It was also the 59th consecutive month of net inflows for these products.
Yet aggregate fund flows in the UK during December were set to be remembered as their worst for just over two years, albeit positive at £39.8 million, according to Calastone recently.
In the UK, tracker funds accounted for 15.7% of the UK industry’s funds under management, the IA said.
Mixed asset and property funds were the only two asset classes that had positive overall net sales, while equity, bond and money market funds in the UK saw outflows.
The resilience of ETF sales when contrasted with wider flow data in the funds industry goes back to at least September.
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